Quote

Swedes are such a civilised, perfect society - at least on the surface. There's a great safety net, a huge middle class, free education, free health care. People are very polite, they wait their turn. They're not too loud, they're not too quiet, but sometimes it's a little too perfect.

People in Sweden are very conscious of what people are saying about you.

Swedes are a really humble and shy people in many ways, but I think it's pretty much the same as in the U.S. Little girls want to take photographs with me at lunch.

My friends who are not from Sweden tell me that I'm more reserved or maybe more ... I guess the opposite of what a Latin American would be. Maybe because Scandinavians are more careful with their words and I guess it takes a lot to become a friend of a Swede.

I think one thing with Sweden is that in some way the Swedish society is a very good society, almost perfect on the surface. That is something that makes the writers forced to see what is underneath the surface, because it's always something underneath the surface, of course.

I love Sweden. The entire world should be like Sweden. They all like to drink and get naked, and the women are hot. I can't think of a better nation on the planet.

For me, at least, much of the German I see and hear sounds stranger than Swedish, a language of which I unfortunately understand very little.

I speak Swedish, it's my first language. Of course, growing up with Latin American parents from Argentina, I also have some other influences from other cultures. But Sweden is where I feel the most at home.

What's sometimes really overwhelming in Sweden is the uniformity. People kind of disappear by all looking the same and wearing the same clothes. There are a lot of great individuals, but it can become a very blank and bleak picture.

Northern Sweden holds a special kind of magic. It's cold, lonely, and the people are tough and silent, or so the stereotype says. This is Asa Larsson's home turf and I find as much joy in reading her closely observed descriptions of the environment, as in following her intriguing plots.